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GOOD 

AND 

TRUE THOUGHT: 

ROBERT BROWNING 

Life means learning- 

to abhor 
The false and love 

the true. — 

Fifine at the Fair. 




N?W YORK 
COPYRIGHT, ISS8 BY 

nxmiCK A. STOKES & BROTH5R 
18SJ 



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GOOD AND TRUE THOUGHTS 

FROM 

ROBERT BROWNING. 



— Into the truth of things, — 

Out of their falseness rise, and reach 
thou and remain ! 

Fifine at the Fair. 

God's gift was, that man should 

conceive of truth 
And yearn to gain it, catching at 

mistake, 
As midway help, till he reach fact 

indeed. 

A Death in the Desert. 

— There's nothing in nor out 

o' the world 
Good, except truth. 

. The Ring and the Book, 

Hear the truth, and bear the truth, 

And bring the truth to bear on all you are, 

And do, assured that only good comes 

thence 
Whate'er the shape good take ! 

Prince Hohenstiel Schivangau. 



GOOD AND TR UE THO UGH TS. 3 

Learn life's lesson : hate of evil, 
love of good. 

La Sazsi'as. 

And consequent upon the learning how 

from strife 
Grew peace, — from evil, good, — came 

knowledge, that to get 
Acquaintance with the way o' the world, 

we must nor fret 
Nor fume on altitudes of self-sufficiency, 
But bid a frank farewell to what — we 

think — should be — 
And with as good a grace, welcome 

what is — we find. 

Fifine at the Faz'r. 

Man's work is to labor and leaven — 
As best he may — earth here with heaven ; 
'Tis work for work's sake that he's needing : 
Let him work on and on as if speeding 
Work's end, but not dream of succeeding ! 
Because if success were intended, 
Why heaven would begin ere earth ended. 
Of Pacchiarotto. 



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GOOD AND TRUE THOUGHTS. 



— A man's reach should exceed his grasp. 
Or what's a heaven for ? 

Andrea del Sartu. 

— This world's no blot for us, 
Nor blank — it means intensely, and 
means good. 

Lippo Lippi. 

The common problem, yours, mine, 

every one's, 
Is not to fancy what were fair in life 
Provided it could be— but finding first 
What may be, then find how to make it 

fair 
Up to our means — a very different thing ! 
BisJi op Blougra m . 

— I count life just a stuff 
To try the soul's strength on, educe 
the man. 

In a Balcony. 






GOOD AND TR UE THO UGHTS. 5 

Poor vaunt of life indeed, 

Were man but formed to feed 

On joy, to solely seek and find and feast ; 

Such feasting ended, then, 

As sure an end to men ; — 

Rabbi Ben Ezra. 

Who knows what's fit for us ? Had fate 
Proposed bliss here should sublimate 
My being; had I signed the bond — 
Still one must lead some life beyond 
— Have a bliss to die with, dim-descried. 
This foot once planted on the goal, 
This glory-garland round my soul, 
Could I descry such ? Try and test ! 
I sink back shuddering from the quest. 
Earth being so good, would Heaven seem 
best? 

The Last Ride Together. 

This life is brief, and troubles die with it : 
Where were the prick to soar up 
homeward, else? 

The Ring; aiid the Book. 






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6 GOOD AND TR UE THO UGHTS. 

Then welcome each rebuff, 

That turns earth's smoothness rough, 

Each sting, that bids nor sit nor stand, 

but go ! 
Be our joys three parts pain, 
Strive, and hold cheap the strain ; 
Learn, nor account the pang; dare, 

never grudge the throe ! 

Rabbi Ben Ezra. 



The man taught enough by life's 

dream, of the rest to make sure, 

By the pain-throb, triumphantly 
winning intensified bliss, 

And the next world's reward and 

repose, by the struggle in this. 

Saul. 



Through the outward sign, the inward 

grace allures, 
And sparks from heaven transpierce 

earth's coarsest covertures. 

Fifine at the Fair. 






8 GOOD AND TRUE THOUGHTS. 

There shall never be one lost good ! 

What was, shall live as before ; 
The evil is null, is naught, is silence 

implying sound ; 
What was good, shall be good, with, 

for evil, so much good more ; 
On the earth the broken arcs ; in the 

Heaven, a perfect round. 

| All we have willed or hoped or dreamed 

*? ' of good, shall exist ; 

Not its likeness, but itself ; no beauty, 

nor good, nor power 

Whose voice has gone forth, but each 

^ ) survives for the melodist, 

When eternity affirms the conception 

of an hour. 

Abt Vogler. 

I trust in God — The Right shall be 

the Right. 
And other than the Wrong, while He 

endures — 
I trust in my own soul, that can perceive 
The outward and the inward, nature's good, 

And God's 

A SouVs Tragedy. 



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GOOD AND TRUE THOUGHTS. 



So absolutely good is truth, truth never 

hurts 
The teller, whose worst crime gets 

somehow grace, avowed. 

Fifine at the Fair. 



Aspire, break bounds ! I say 

Endeavor to be good, and better still, 
And best ! success is naught, endeavor's all. 
Turf and Towers. 



It's wiser being good than bad ; 

It's safer being meek than fierce : 
It's fitter being sane than mad. 

My own hope is, a sun will pierce 
The thickest cloud earth ever stretched ; 

That, after Last, returns the First, 
Though a wide compass round be fetched ; 
That what began best, can't end worst, 
Nor what God blest once, prove accurst. 
Apparent Failure. 



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io GOOD AND TRUE THOUGHTS. 



Why stay we on the earth unless 
to grow ? 

Cleon. 

Tis a life-long toil till our lump be 

leaven — 
The better ! what's come to perfection 

perishes. 
Things learned on earth, we shall 

practice in heaven. 
Works done least rapidly, Art most 

cherishes. 

Old Pictures in Florence. 



What were life 



Did soul stand still therein, forego her 

strife 
Through the ambiguous Present, to the 

goal 
Of some all-reconciling Future ? 

Soul, 
Nothing has been, which shall not 

bettered be, 
Hereafter,— Gerard de Lairesse. 



GOOD AND TRUE THOUGHTS, it 



Was it not great ? did he not throw- 
on God, 
(He loves the burthen) — 

God's task to make the heavenly period 
perfect the earthen ? 

The Grammarian's Funeral. 



Of Wrong make Right, and turn 111 
Good, below. 

Sordetto. 



Let things be — not seem, 
counsel rather, — do, and nowise dream. 

Gerard de Lat'resse. 



— From the beginning love is whole 
And true ; if sure of naught beside, 

most sure 
Of its own truth at least ; — 

Sorddlo. 



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12 GOOD AND TRUE THOUGHTS. 



Love bids touch truth, endure truth, 

and embrace 
Truth, though, embracing truth, love 

crush itself. 

Turf and Towers. 



To have to do with nothing but the true, 
The good, the eternal. 

The Ring and the Book. 



Such was my rule of life : I worked 

my best, 
Subject to ultimate judgment, — God's 

not man's. 

Prince Hoheustiel Schwangan. 



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